Customers said they regularly pay between $100-$200 every month for cable, Internet and phone bundles. People with premium packages pay even more money, often for channels they will never watch.

"There's just too many (channels)," said AT&T U-verse customer Tamara Ziegler. "On a regular basis, we probably watch about 20 to 25 of these channels."

She said her family often wonders why they have the service in the first place.

Last year, Ziegler said she called AT&T to cancel her cable service and wound up getting offered a deal for $60 off instead.

"They said, 'Well, we don't want you to completely give up cable, so we'd like to offer you a special discount,'" Ziegler said.

"That's what their game is right now. That's what their whole game is right now, period. They don't have much choice," said Tony Tocco, a professor at Rockhurst University.

He said Time Warner Cable had a virtual monopoly on cable and Internet service in town. Now, Kansas City-area customers can choose from AT&T U-verse, Surewest, Comcast, satellite customers and even Google Fiber.

Tocco said he knocked $63 off his AT&T bill last summer when Surewest tried to sign him up.

"Customers have a tremendous opportunity to lower their costs," he said. "They should be taking advantage of it."

"We want to keep every customer. We want to add customers," said AT&T spokesman Chris Lester. "So we'll talk to folks. Absolutely, because we would rather keep a customer as go find a new one, quite honestly."

Time Warner Cable and AT&T both said they will make deals to keep customers or steal them from the competition. However, it's usually up to the customer to ask, usually under the threat to leave. Experts said all companies want to charge as much for their product as people are willing to pay.

"Call and ask and see what kind of a deal you can get," Ziegler said.

A customer's chances of getting a discount also hinge on whether he or she is under contract with a cable provider and whether there's a second provider serving the neighborhood.

Tocco said companies won't make deals if they have a monopoly in the area.

When asked to comment on local competition, Time Warner said in a statement, "That's why we offer a variety of video and Internet services and different packages, so customers can customize their information and entertainment services to meet their needs and budgets."

Some people are taking another option and dropping cable entirely. In a post on the KMBC 9 News Facebook page, Brian Maupin said, "I get over-the-air HD (television) and use Netflix and Hulu for TV shows. Overall, I pay less than $15 a month for basically the same amount of content cable offers."